


Disconnected

by Apfeltree



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Fluffy, M/M, au???? ish
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-11-27
Updated: 2015-02-11
Packaged: 2018-02-27 04:04:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2678348
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Apfeltree/pseuds/Apfeltree
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Jack falls a little too hard, he seems to be unable to speak English.  Although the effects are only temporary, a series of events, a translating app, and hockey lead to something else.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

_It all started with an especially hard hit._

Jack blinked a couple of times, his pupils dilating wildly under the harsh arena lights.  He grimaced, rubbing his temple where his head had smacked the ice just moments- was it moments- before.  He let out a small groan, then looked up, into the wide, worried face of coach Hall.

“Jack?  Can you focus on my pencil, please?”  Behind him, Bittle, Shitty, and Lardo stood, almost identical expressions of worry etched onto their faces.  Jack focused on coach, as the older man brought the pencil towards his face and away from it, tracking his pupils.  Up, down, side to side.  Finally, coach put his hands on his knees.  “Okay.  Now, can you tell me what day it is?”  Jack rolled his eyes.  He had a bit of a headache, yes, but really?  He’d been concussed before.  He knew what it felt like.

“It’s Monday, and I’m fine, honestly.  We should get back to practice, yeah?”  Jack moved to stand up, reaching for his helmet, and glanced at coach, who now looked even more worried.  “What?” Jack asked.

Shitty hummed.  “Well,” he said.  “That’s sure as fuck not normal.”  Jack looked at his teammate.

“ _Comment cela?_ ”  And then he snapped his mouth shut.

Bittle volunteered to take him to Health Services, and while they both changed out of their gear in the change room, Jack was grinding his teeth so much he could swear it was audible.  The little thing, the thing that turned his French into English, wasn’t working.  He wanted to see if it was just his voice, but he was definitely speaking in French, which was both annoying and weird.  In a desperate effort to break the silence, Bitty started babbling.

“You know, it’s not that odd,” he said in his southern lilt.  “This one time during a routine, this girl clunked me right over the head with her skate.  I saw fuzzy in one eye for a _week_ , and they had no idea why.  It passed though.  You’re probably just a ‘lil fuddled.”  Jack nodded encouragingly, and prepared a sentence in what was hopefully the right language.

“Non, je sais ce-que tu veux dire.  Un des gars sur mon ancienne équipe m’a frappé si fort que je ne pouvais pas marché droit pour le reste de la journée.”  _Fuck._ Bittle pursed his lips and quickly wiped his skates, stuffing them into his bag.  He reached over and patted Jack on the arm.

“Yeah, let’s get you over to a doctor real quick, Jack.”  With a grudging sigh, Jack agreed, and off they went, each boy slinging a full hockey bag over his shoulder- Jack with a bit more ease than Bitty.  They were almost halfway across the north quad when Jack finally audibly _tsk-_ ed.

“Manger plus de protéines, Bittle.” 

Bittle laughed. 

“I don’t speak a lick of French and I got that one.  Thanks, Jack.  I am both offended and amused.”  Jack gave Bittle a lopsided grin as the smaller boy heaved up his hockey bag with a slight grunt, and they spent the rest of the walk in comfortable silence.

…       

The doctor declared it a “coping mechanism”, due to slight swelling in the brain.  Since Jack could understand what everyone was saying- although he did have to translate everything painstakingly into French, which was starting to get annoying.  The doctor, an older Indian man by the name of Dr. Ravel, told him and Bitty that if Jack wasn’t speaking any English within the week, they should come back in so that he could do a full scan.

After calling coach Hall to explain the news, Bitty took Jack to Annie’s, where they sat while Jack banged his head slowly over and over again on the table.

“Ben, câlice,” Jack muttered.  “Mon maudite stupide cerveau qui ne parle pas Anglais. Tabernouche, je m’en _fous,_ là!”  He rubbed his forehead against the table, careful not to roll onto the bruise that was most likely blossoming quite prettily on his temple, and paused his quiet tantrum to take a sip of coffee.   He glanced at Bitty, who was watching him with a somewhat amused expression, and narrowed his eyes.  “Tu ne le trouvais pas drôle, si c’était toi, là.  C’est simplement mon capacité d’être un personne gentille que je ne sacre pas usuellement.  _Bittle_ -” Jack slammed his hands down on the table, making Bittle’s tea splash out of his mug, “ _Comment es-ce-que je parlerais a l’équipe_?”  Bittle sighed.

“Screw it.  I’m downloading a translating app. Hold on- say that again?”  After reading the translation, Bitty laughed.  “That’s actually… really valid.  Um, who’s the alternate?” 

“Shitty.  Il me remplacera, c’est correct.  Ben, là.  Dieux, ça m’ennuie.”  Jack sighed again, rubbing a hand through his hair.  Taking another sip of his coffee, he touched the tender spot on his temple and frowned. 

“Là, Bittle, donnez-moi ton cellulaire.”  Grabbing the phone out of Bittle’s hands, he inspected his forehead critically, his frown deepening.  “Wow, c’est large, ça.”  He poked at the walnut sized bruise, which was a dark, angry purple, and seemed to be pulsing slightly.  Bitty nodded, clearly catching his meaning.

“Yeah, now there’s a shiner.  I’ve got to say- I’m surprised you don’t have a concussion.  Well, I guess this sucks too, in its own way.  I mean, at least you can still understand me, right?” 

Jack nodded. “C’est vrai.  Ça pourrait être pire.”  He slapped the table again, more lightly this time. “Ben, on-y-va.  J’ai faim, et le salle à manger sert des tacos aujourd’hui, et je fucking _aime_ des tacos.”

Jack went to sleep with a headache and a serious amount of alcohol hiding in his room, ready to be consumed by whoever decided to show up to the post-game kegger that always ended up destroying the Haus. 

The headache, anyways, wasn’t so much a by-product of hitting the ice as it was from the strain of trying to translate everything everyone was saying from English to French and wondering why he couldn’t do it in the opposite direction.  He even spent a while whispering to himself, trying to remember the English words that wouldn’t come out of his mouth.  It was frustrating to no end, and finally he gave up, rolling over and going to sleep with that empty feeling you get when you couldn’t remember the right word.


	2. One Step At A Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's nothing worse than a headache that won't go away.

Jack woke up with a pounding head and a bruise the size of the entirety of Canada shining brightly over his temple. For a brief moment, he wondered if this was some kind of osmosis, and the mere existence of all the booze in the corner was actually giving him a hangover, but no- it seemed to just be the effects of a near concussion. Downstairs, he could hear Bittle humming as he moved around in the kitchen, the sound of something crackling in a pan winding its way up the stairs, accompanied by the smell of French toast. With a sigh, Jack rolled out of bed, put on pants, and followed the smell to the source.   
Everyone knew what kind of person Jack was in the mornings, pre-coffee. Everyone always joked that there was normal bitchy Jack, and then there was pre-game bitchy Jack, and then- worst of all- morning bitchy Jack. And this morning? Jack sure as hell had something to be bitchy about. The only person who could really stand it was Bitty, most likely due to the fact that he was such a sunny person that nothing could penetrate his outer layer of happiness. Somehow ignoring the look of absolute murder on Jack’s face, the small boy managed to smiled warmly.  
“Sleep well?” he asked. “I made coffee. Wait- actually I think Shitty drank most of it, he’s off doing something involving early mornings and Lardo… Well, you could make coffee?”   
Jack sighed, just loud enough that Bittle could hear him, and trudged over to the coffee maker, where he proceeded to sigh some more as he morosely poured more coffee grounds into a filter and set the maker to brew.   
“You know, the only thing I genuinely miss when I’m in the States is Tim Hortons. Fucking love that stuff.” He shook his head at the Folgers’ brand can, and turned to Bitty, who was looking somewhat pensively at him. Jack thought for a second. “Je le fais toujours, non?”   
Bittle nodded slowly, and Jack groaned.  
“But you’ve got a really nice shiner? If that helps?”   
“Pas vraiment.”   
Bitty shrugged, and then went back to his oven, where he was cooking what smelled like eggs and possibly even bacon. With his coffee in hand (Jack took his coffee with milk and sugar, much to the chagrin of Holster and Ransom, who, as “the epitome of manliness”, took their coffee black, and therefore never drank coffee, because it was fucking disgusting black) he sat down at the table and listened to Bittle chatter.   
“You know what I never make up here? Grits. I love grits, my Meemaw makes these ones with cheese oh my god they’re so good. They’re so damn hard to find, though, I honestly don’t know why. All y’all eat rice. Which is fine too, but grits. Maybe I’ll bring some up at Christmas and we can have a proper southern meal on New Year’s! If anyone’s here. Which they won’t be. But anyways… Excited for the game tonight?”   
Jack smiled, his sluggish brain trying to process Bittle’s English.   
“Heuh… ouais.” He said this with another, somewhat more engaging smile. “On ne parle pas beaucoup quand nous jouons.” Bittle nodded knowingly, then continued on chattering.   
“I guess it’ll be okay, ‘cause we don’t really talk much when we play, right? I mean, you say my name n’all but… not a lot of witty banter. Ooh- except for that time that Holster came up with thirty ways he was gonna kill that one d-man on the Harvard team. Man number twenty-four still gives me the shivers. That boy definitely needs to watch less Criminal Minds.”   
Jack nodded, draining his coffee. As he stood up to get another mug, he felt the world roll under him and his hand shot out, grabbing the table for support. Bitty jumped at the sound of the mug he’d been holding breaking against the linoleum.   
“…Jack?”   
“Tabarnak, je me sens mal.”   
“Jack..? Are y’all all right? Jack?”   
…  
And that was how he and Bittle ended up in the doctor’s office for a second time, a bashful Dr. Ravel examining a picture of a CT-scan.   
“Well Jack, I sure am sorry about yesterday- it seems you got a bit more than a knock on the noggin. Your scan’s showing a bit of what looks like a concussion. And you still aren’t great with your languages?   
Jack, in the waiting room, had found that the more he focused on the sounds of English, the better his English got, and so managed a not really, though it only increased the splitting sensation in his head.   
“Well okay, don’t strain yourself. A couple of weeks of rest and you’ll be back in shape. And I know your kind, Jack Zimmerman- I mean rest. No electronic screens, no music, absolutely no drinking, no drugs, et cetera. And you’re on what for your anxiety?” Jack glanced at Bittle, who was now suddenly unbelievably absorbed in his phone. He debated as to whether or not he actually minded Bittle’s presence, and decided that he didn’t. Tapping Bittle’s phone, Jack motioned to the translate app.  
“Je ne prends plus rien, en fait. ”  
“Well, that’s all right, then. As long as it doesn’t overwhelm you, am I right?” the doctor let out a low whistle as he scanned the rest of the document in front of him. “Well, if you could book another appointment for this Saturday… and oh- no hockey, you understand me?”  
No hockey? It was like saying no food. The look of absolute devastation was apparently so funny that Bittle felt the need to take a picture, but it was a grave diagnosis. Two entire weeks of having to sit in the box, doing nothing. Two entire weeks. Bittle, it seemed, did not understand how horrible this was.   
“you know,” Bittle said, “It’s only one game, and then you’ll be right back on your feet. No one can fault you for a concussion.”  
Jack thought that was unlikely.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am SO SORRY I didn't update sooner. Can I just say thank you to everyone who's reading this, and I really hope that I'm not this horrible in the future???? (I may be this horrible don't rely on me I'm a terrible person)


End file.
